973.7L63   He  Watched  Lincoln 
RH34       Write  His  Name, 

or,  The  Boy  Who  Saw 
Abraham  Lincoln. 

[WCTU  handout,  ca.  193©] 


LINCOLN  ROOM 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
LIBRARY 


MEMORIAL 

the  Class  of  1901 

founded  by 

HARLAN  HOYT  HORNER 

and 

HENRIETTA  CALHOUN  HORNER 


He  Watched  Lincoln  Write 
His  Name 

or 

THE    BOY    WHO   SAW    ABRAHAM 
LINCOLN 


If  you  had  been  a  little  boy  when  your 
great  grandfather  was  a  little  boy;  and  if 
you  had  lived  in  a  log  cabin  way  off  in  the 
country  with  only  your  father  and  mother; 
and  if  your  boy  friend  from  the  nearest 
neighbor's  house  had  come  along  and  said, 
"Come  on,  let's  go  over  to  the  new  school 
house;  there  is  to  be  a  meeting  there  this 
afternoon,"  what  would  you  have  done? 

Just  what  Cleophas  Breckenridge  did 
many  years  ago,  when  your  great  grand- 
fathers were  ,boys.  He  asked  his  father  and 
mother  if  he  might  go.  They  said,  "Yes," 
and  away  he  went  with  his  chum,  across 
the  fields  and  through  the  woods  to  the  new 
school  house.  The  word  "new"  meant  a 
great  deal  to  them,  because  until  then  there 
had  been  no  school  house  and  no  school  in 
this  new  country  where  Cleophas  lived,  and 
so  he  had  never  been  to  school. 

It  was  a  hot  summer  afternoon,  so  when 
the  two  boys  came  in  sight  of  the  new 
school  house  they  saw  the  people  who  had 
come  to  the  meeting  sitting  around  outside 
on  stumps  and  logs  that  had  been  left  over 
after  the  log  school  house  was  built. 
Among  the  people  was  a  tall  young  man 
whom  Cleophas  had  never  seen.  Some  one 
told  the  boys  that  this  was  the  man  who 
was  to  speak  to  the  meeting,  and  that  his 
name  was  Abraham  Lincoln. 
1 


That  name  did  not  mean  as  mueh  to 
Cleophas  and  his  friend  as  it  does  to  you 
boys  and  girls.  He  did  not  know  he  was 
looking  at  the  man  who  was  to  be  one  of 
the  great  presidents  of  the  United  States, 
whose  name  would  be  known  and  honored 
all  over  the  world.  It  was  not  until  years 
afterward  that  €leophas  knew  he  had  good 
reason  to  remember  that  day  at  the  new 
log  school  house. 

iSoon  Abraham  Lincoln  began  to  speak. 
He  talked  to  the  people  about  the  harm  and 
unhappiness  caused  by  alcoholic  drinks. 
The  harm  does  not  always  stop  with  the 
drinker,  lit  may  cause  him  to  do  harm  to 
other  people.  He  may  want  his  drink  so 
much  and  spend  so  much  of  his  money  for 
it  that  his  family  "becomes  very  poor  and 
friends  and  neighbors  have  to  give  them 
food  and  clothes. 

Then  Mr.  Lincoln  told  them  why  it  was 
better  not  to  use  any  alcoholic  drinks.  He 
told  them  of  the  better  health,  the  happier 
homes  and  the  better  pleasures  that  the 
money  saved  from  drink  would  buy. 

Of  course  Cleophas  could  not  remember 
every  word  of  Abraham  Lincoln's  speech 
that  afternoon.  It  was  not  taken  down  by 
some  one  and  printed  so  that  all  the  world 
could  read  it,  like  the  famous  speech  he 
made  at  Gettysburg  years  afterward  when 
he  was  President.  But  Cleophas  remem- 
bered very  clearly  one  thing  which  hap- 
pened at  the  close  of  that  school  house 
speech  which  shows  that  the  people  must 
have  thought  well  of  what  was  said.  Taking 
a  folded,  printed  paper  from  his  pocket, 
Abraham  Lincoln  told  the  people  that  it 
was  a  "pledge,"  a  promise  not  to  use  alco- 
holic drinks.  Many  thousands  of  people, 
he  said,  had  signed  it.  He  had  signed  it 
himself,  and  he  would  be  glad  if  the  people 


at  this  meeting  who  wished  to  do  so  would 
sign  it,  too.  He  read  the  pledge  to  the  peo- 
ple and  this  is  what  it  said: 

"Whereas,  the  use  of  alcoholic  liquors  as 
a  beverage  is  productive  of  pauperism, 
degradation,  and  crime,  and  believing  that 
it  is  our  duty  to  discourage  that  which  pro- 
duces more  evil  than  good,  we  therefore 
pledge  ourselves  to  abstain  from  the  use  of 
intoxicating  liquors  as  a  beverage." 

The  paper  containing  the  pledge  was 
placed  on  the  top  of  a  broad  stump  and 
many  people  came  up  and  signed  their 
names.  Cleophas  wanted  very  much  to  sign 
it. 

All  at  once  he  looked  up  and  saw  Mr. 
Lincoln   standing   in   front   of  him. 

"Sonny,  don't  you  want  your  name  on 
this    pledge?"   Mr.   Lincoln    asked   him. 

"Yes,   sir,"  Cleophas   answered. 

"You  know  what  it  means,  that  you  will 
not  use   alcoholic   drinks?" 

"Yes  sir,  I  know,"  Cleophas  replied,  "but 
I  have  never  been  to  school  and  I  don't 
know  how  to  write  my  name." 

"Then  I  will  write  it  for  you,"  said  Mr. 
Lincoln.  "If  you  stand  right  here  and 
watch  me  do  it,  it  will  be  just  as  good  as 
if  you  did  it. 

So  Cleophas  looked  on  and  saw  his  name, 
Cleophas  Breckenridge,  written  below  the 
other  names,  in  Abraham  Lincoln's  own 
handwriting. 

Then,  placing  his  hand  on  the  boy's  head, 
Mr.  Lincoln  said: 

"Now,  sonny,  you  keep  that  pledge  and  it 
will  be  the  best  act  of  your  life." 

And  Cleophas  kept  the  pledge  as  long  as 
he  lived. 

1.  This  story  was  originally  announced  as 
"The  Boy  Who  Saw  Abraham  Lincoln."  It 
has  been  written  for  reproduction  by  pupils 

.3 


in  the  fourth  school  year,  in  the  W.  C.  T.  U. 
prize  essay  contest  for  1926-27.  It  is  to  be 
told  or  read  to  the  children,  retold  by  them 
in  their  own  words  and  then  written.  It 
may  be  illustrated  by  cut-out  pictures  or  b$ 
original  drawings. 

2.  This  pledge  should  be  written  on  the 
blackboard  for  the  children  to  copy  into 
their  reproduction  of  the  story,  as  it  is  too 
long  to  expect  them  to  remember  exactly. 
It  contains  some  words  that  will  probably 
need  previous  explanation.  It  is  desirable 
that  the  meaning  of  the  pledge  should  be 
made  clear,  and  it  may  serve  as  the  subject 
of  a  temperance  lesson  as  to  how  the  ef- 
fects of  alcohol  lead  to  the  want  and  spoiled 
lives,  and  injury  to  others  which  the  pledge 
describes  as  "pauperism,  degradation  and 
crime." 


Department  of  Scientific  Temperance  Instruc- 
tion. Price,  2  cents;  per  50,  25  cents;  per  100, 
45   cents. 

NATIONAL    W.  C.  T.  U.    PUBLISHING    HOUSE 
Evanston,    III. 


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